laps

< That this is pleasure and not torment for the client is something survivors of the late 20c. will have to explain to their youngers. v.1“take up liquid with the tongue,” from Old English lapian “to lap up, drink,” from Proto-Germanic *lapajanan (cf. Old High German laffen “to lick,” Old Saxon lepil, Dutch lepel, German Löffel “spoon”), from PIE imitative base *lab- (cf. Greek laptein “to sip, lick,” Latin lambere “to lick”), indicative of licking, lapping, smacking lips. Meaning “splash gently” first recorded 1823, based on similarity of sound. Related: Lapped; lapping. v.2“to lay one part over another,” early 14c., “to surround (something with something else),” from lap (n.). Figurative use, “to envelop (in love, sin, desire, etc.)” is from mid-14c. The sense of “to get a lap ahead (of someone) on a track” is from 1847, on notion of “overlapping.” The noun in this sense is 1670s, originally “something coiled or wrapped up;” meaning “a turn around a track” (1861) also is from this sense. Related: Lapped; lapping; laps. In addition to the idioms beginning with lap